Here’s how the weekend goes for those of you not groveling for College World Series tickets…

Tonight you got Matson Jones at O’Leaver’s. I’m listening to their debut CD right now — two cellos, bass, drums and solid vocals. Who needs guitars when you can play the same riffs on an instrument that you cradle between your legs (added bonus, both cellists and vocalists are women)? Everyone made a big deal about Tegan and Sara when they blew through here a month or so ago. These guys blow them away. See them now before they explode. Opening is Kisses for Kicks (Reagan Roeder). 9:30 p.m., $5.

Tomorrow night, two hot shows at the same time, and I’ll probably miss both due to a mandatory family function — such is life. The 49’r has a sweet three-band bill featuring The Ointments (Reagan Roeder, Kyle Harvey, Landon Hedges), Mal Madrigal and headliners The Third Men (ex-The Sons of…), all for $3. Meanwhile, at O’Leaver’s there’s another sweet three-band show with Landing on the Moon (A new project featuring Oliver Morgan and his wife, Megan, who we last saw performing together in The Quiet Type), The Potomac Accord and Kite Pilot with new drummer Jeremy Stanosheck (see the June 14 Lazy-i blog entry). $5, 9:30.

Finally on Sunday night Sokol Underground is hosting Head Automatica, a combo featuring members of Glassjaw and Gorillaz. Their debut, Decadence, was released by Warner Bros. and what I’ve heard of it on their site (the homepage has a player with most of it loaded) reminds me of NYC dance bands mixed with ’70s FM rock; mainstream but kind of fun. Opening is Nightmare of You and The Fury. $10, 9 p.m.

Watch this-here blog this weekend for live reviews and other updates…

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Column 29: The Passion of the Fratt
Homer’s new leader does it for the love of it…

Rick Galusha’s announcement that he was stepping down from the helm of Homer’s Records came as no surprise. Galusha sounded less than upbeat last year when he and I took part in a panel discussion for a UNO business class for entrepreneurs. Maybe he was distracted since the panel took place smack-dab in the middle of his heated race for Register of Deeds, which he would eventually lose. Regardless, that day in class Galusha seemed to make the point that rock and roll was a young man’s game, not something that someone his age should be involved with. It’s an opinion that I happen to disagree with, but hey, everyone’s got a point of view.

Enter young Mike Fratt (only 46), who’s been playing the role of second banana at Homer’s for years. Now with his ascension to top banana (Fratt says he still doesn’t have a title and isn’t in any hurry to get one, thank you), the boy wonder has a lot to figure out. Like how he’s going to keep Homer’s afloat amidst market-share killers like music downloading and file sharing, big-ass box stores like Wal-Mart, Best Buy and Target, and the ever-fickle whims of the Omaha music-buying public.

Fratt says no prob on all three. In fact, despite all those forecasts of doom and gloom for the music retail industry, he’s confident sales will continue to come up roses through the end of the decade.

The operative word there is “continue.” Because in spite of all the hype about downloading eating up the music retail biz, Homer’s revenues have been on an upswing for the past 18 months. Fratt says the chain’s combined six-store sales are up over last year, and that it’s a trend that’s being seen throughout the independent music retail sector. While the industry as a whole is down 8 percent so far for the year, Homer’s sales were up by single digits (Fratt wouldn’t say how many).

It’s more evidence of how the big box stores have seen their dominance slip to indie chains and online sales. As a result, they’re cutting back on their selection. Best Buy, for example, dropped its CD selection from 15,000 titles just a few years ago to only 5,000. Add to that the fact that most people who go to box stores to pick up the latest chart-topping Britney crapola at loss-leader prices leave with only one CD; while Homer’s shoppers tend to pick up a couple more items before heading to the check outs.

Selection didn’t matter as much a few years ago. The big money was in the mega-sellers. But those mega-sellers are becoming fewer and fewer these days. In 2000, only 100 CDs sold more than a million copies in a single year. Last year that number dropped to 60. “People are finding that these big, hyped records are bullshit, and that there are a lot cooler records out there,” Fratt said. Records that you’re not going to find at Wal-Mart.

Yeah, but what about i-Tunes and downloading? Fratt, whose been involved in music retailing since ’75, says the Internet and satellite radio are helping — not hurting — his business because they’re exposing listeners to more music than ever before. “That’s influencing sales,” he said. “All those predictions that Internet web stores and file sharing would wipe us out haven’t come close to reality.”

If anything, Fratt says the web has hurt the box stores more than the small indie retailers. And Homer’s is making money with its own internet ventures, including a web store and sales efforts in conjunction with Amazon, eBay and Django’s.

Still, Fratt is quick to point out that there’s never been a lot of money in the music retail business, even at the head office. What keeps him going is what got him started way back when he was a stock boy at Brandeis in Crossroads. “I kept going down to Musicland on my breaks and bugging them for a job, until they finally broke down and hired me,” he said. “I fell in love with it. People that come to work here have a passion for music and want to share it with every customer that walks through the door.”

So I watched that new super-exciting sure-to-be-a-hit reality game show last night on one of the big 3 networks (can’t remember which, seeing as I rarely watch any of the trio these days) — the show where they dig up the corpses of ’80s one-hit wonders, roll their bloated carcasses on stage, plug them into a 220 and we all get to watch the effects of the aging process right before our eyes and decide who’s suffered the least ill effects. The only one suffering, however, are the people watching the show.

I’m talking about Hit Me Baby One More Time, the gameshow where five bands from the ’80s “reform” to play their one hit along with a cover of a “modern-day classic.” It’s somewhat obscene, almost prurient in its voyeuristic attempt at taking advantage of the post Babyboomers/Gen X’ers who yearn for a return to a “better day” when the bands were fun and music was delightfully insipid.

A year ago, VH1 tried a similar nostalgia-fueled program called Bands Reunited, where the host spent an hour tracking down members of long-broken-up bands and tried to convince them to get together one more time for a night of reminiscing and rock. Throughout the journey, viewers were told the band’s history in classic Behind the Music style, explaining the rise and fall and ultimate break-up, confronting band members one-by-one to get their take on what went down. If the show was successful and got all the members to agree (and they weren’t always, Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Extreme never took the stage), then we were shown the moment when the band meets again for the first time, followed by a one-day practice session and a performance in front of an audience later that same evening. I loved Bands Reunited. It answered a lot of questions while weaving in real human pathos as band members were confronted with their pasts… and futures that didn’t include being rock stars again.

Hit Me Baby One More Time, on the other hand, is somewhat vile. Each reunited band is given a 15-second introduction before being lifted out of the stage amidst a plume of steam (as if being reincarnated from some sort of rock and roll hell). They trot down on stage, take their spot and rip into their “hit” song. Program 1 featured a sad, bloated Loverboy, a blink-and-you-missed-her-the-first-time CeCe Peniston, a should-have-known-better Arrested Development, a pregnant Tiffany and a one-man Flock of Seagulls. And here (beyond just being sad and cheesy) is the program’s biggest flaw. A Flock of Seagulls was one of the bands featured on VH1’s Bands Reunited last year. You saw the real pain the band went through to reconcile for that performance, including two brothers burying the hatchet for the good of the reunion — it felt, well, triumphant. Last night’s version of A Flock of Seagull included only one member — the lead singer. The rest of the flock consisted of replacement hack players. Most of the young kids who watched this show may not realize that they’re not really seeing the reunited band at all, only the bloated front-person. The 12-members of Arrested Development were whittled down to three and a bunch of faceless session people. No one knows who was in Tiffany’s band, so it probably doesn’t matter — she was a novelty act anyway. Loverboy appeared to be only the frontman as well. And I’m still trying to remember who CeCe Peniston was, though she probably sounded the best of the bunch.

After singing their hit, the bands were trotted out again to sing a modern-day cover — painful for the bands and the audience. Then the audience got to pick “a winner” among the five, apparently deciding which held it together the best over the years. Arrested Development won on program one.

Program 2 (which followed directly afterward last night) was only slightly better, thanks to The Knack, who put on a pair of decent performances. The same can’t be said for Haddaway (the guy who sings “What is Love?” the One Night in Roxbury song), The Motels (only the frontwoman), Tommy Tutone (who knows how many on stage last night were in the original band) and America’s biggest prick, Vanilla Ice. Mr. Word to your Mother won that one.

I’m told the show is a big hit, which is no surprise considering that a piece of shit like American Idol is one of the top (if not thee top) program on American television — a program that literally deifies America’s bad taste in music. It now has a worthy companion.

Tomorrow: column 29 — a new man at the helm of Homer’s…

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I stayed up and watched The Faint on Jimmy Kimmel last night. What a strange show. I turned it on just as Andy Dick came on, for apparently no reason. He wasn’t promoting anything, didn’t have really anything to talk about except the Michael Jackson trial and his bible study group. After that, we got something like 30 minutes of commercials, then an idiotic “live report from Neverland,” then what seemed like another 30 minutes of commercials, then The Faint. I thought the band did as well as they could considering the studio’s limitations. The Faint went ahead and used their A/V screens — both set up behind the stage — but used a front- instead of a rear-screen projector. With the stage’s low ceiling, that meant that the band obscured the video throughout the performance. At one time, Todd looked like he was actually bothered by the projector lights being shot right into his eyes. The sound was pretty bad. They played “Paranoiattack” first, and Todd’s vocals sounded almost, uh, too live. The mix was somewhat horrible, so the vocals and instruments sounded strangely separated, almost karaoke-esque. After another zillion commercials, they “played the show off” with “I Disappear,” which sounded a little better. Overall, the whole thing felt awkward and slightly forced, but I guess that’s the nature of performing on late-night network chat-shows. Hardly an accurate representation of what The Faint sound or look like live.

News for Kite Pilot fans — Drummer Corey Broman left the band last month so he could focus on his glass-blowing business — Glass Harmony (if you look at the photo in this Kite Pilot story, you’ll see the band fending off the heat from Broman’s glass kiln/oven-thing). Before he left, Broman finished up his parts on Kite Pilot’s upcoming 10-track full-length, tentatively titled Mercy Will Close It’s Doors, which heads off to Doug Van Sloun for Mastering in mid-July. Taking over the drumming chores for Broman is Jeremy Stanosheck, formerly of Coast of Nebraska, which I’m told has broken up. Stanosheck filled in for Broman before, when Corey was out on tour with Statistics. I have to assume Broman also won’t be touring with Statistics in the future. You can check out the new line-up when Kite Pilot plays with The Potomac Accord and Landing on the Moon (Oliver Morgan’s new project) this Saturday at Sokol Underground.

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Ongoing health issues kept me from the shows this weekend. Nothing serious, just a lingering cold/flu-thing picked up in Ireland and sinus-related maladies. Sucks, because there were three shows I wanted to see, not the least of which was last night’s Mayday CD release show at Mick’s. Anyone who was there, feel free to give us a review on the webboard, which is now back up and running.

Our boys The Faint have their network debut tonight on the Jimmy Kimmel show, appearing with Andy Dick and VH1 personality Rachel Perry. I assume they’ll play either “I Disappear” or “Desperate Guys” (I hope it’s the latter). I’ve never watched Kimmel before. I remember him from the Ben Stein quiz show, though. Seems like a personable chap. It’ll be interesting to see how ABC stages The Faint and how well they’ll come off without their A/V display. There’s no question that network television exposure is a valuable thing for up-and-coming bands, but you gotta wonder just how valuable it really is these days with so many different chat shows going on at once. Kimmel appears to be on top of the second-tier that includes Craig Ferguson and Carson Daly. I suppose a good showing here could push them to Conan or Leno…

I feel the need to clarify recent comments made about The Good Life on this here blog. I didn’t say Cursive’s reemergence meant the end of The Good Life. I said we could be seeing the end of The Good Life as we’ve known it. Read into that statement what you will. Kasher already is on the record as saying The Good Life will be involved in his upcoming stage-play efforts… but what form The Good Life will take is the mystery…

FYI… believe the hype about the new Beck CD…

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Tonight’s keystone event: The Monroes w/ Ideal Cleaners, The Bombardment Society and Brimstone Howl at Sokol Underground. The Monroes are celebrating the release of their brand new 45. Fun starts at 9; $5. Hot show No. 2 tonight is Ladyfinger, Little Brazil and The Philharmonic at Mike’s Place in Council Bluffs (162. W. Broadway). 9:30; $5.

Topping the list on tomorrow night’s hit parade: Mayday (Ted Stevens of Cursive and friends) along with Joe Buck at Duffy’s in Lincoln, $4, 10 p.m.; while right here in River City you got Bad Luck Charm and No Blood Orphan at O’Leaver’s, $5, 10 p.m.; while Rent Money Big is playing over at Mike’s Place (this Mike’s Place place is starting to get a rep; I need to check it out), $5, 9 p.m.

Finally on Sunday, the Mayday CD release party at Mick’s with Kyle Harvey. I hope my cold has subsided by then. $5, 9 p.m. Meanwhile, Fromanhole and Colony of Watts will be at O’Leaver’s, while Sokol Underground has Tooth & Nail artist Me Without You along with Kinsella’s Make Believe project and Veda.

Woo. Look for a more-detailed update tomorrow morning. I’m late for work.

–The webboard is still down for server upgrades. Check back tomorrow if you have something on your mind, or e-mail me. —

A few other things happened while I was gone last week which I forgot to mention. The Reader announced a number of management shifts June 2 including Summer Miller rising to the esteemed position of Editor in Chief — a well-deserved promotion, methinks, though I don’t know what the difference is between “managing editor” and “editor-in-chief” except maybe Publisher John Heaston will be out of her hair… somewhat. Summer’s ascension made room for City Weekly Managing Editor Andrew Norman to come over to The Reader and take Summer’s old job (I assume Andrew quit at the CW? Imagine if he didn’t…). Maybe the strangest announcement, however, was that The Reader purchased The Pulp, a weekly newspaper that was part satire, part criticism and thoroughly confusing. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, though one would presume Heaston traded a handful of Stacy’s Car Wash coupons and whatever spare change he had in his pocket for all of The Pulp‘s office equipment/computers/stationary and former Pulp publisher Al Johnson, who will now work selling Directorio Latino, the Spanish-language phone book Heaston prints with ABM in South Omaha. “We’ll be continuing all of The Pulp‘s advertising contracts and we’ve already started talking with their writers. The last issue of The Pulp as a separate publication hit the streets yesterday,” Heaston said in a memo to Reader writers/staff. No idea what that means. What I do know is that right under the Omaha World-Herald‘s nose Heaston is quietly building a small publishing empire that already includes El Perico, Today’s Omaha Woman and a bunch of other magazines and websites. Can Voice of the New City be next? It might be too late — a QT video found at www.omahavoice.com has ominous overtones.

Hot show tonight: Omaha/Lincoln band The Terminals takes the O’Leaver’s stage with Chicago band MOTO, while California singer-songwriter Adam Derry is at Sokol Underground with Kyle Harvey and Reagan Roeder. Derry apparently used to live in Omaha and bills himself as “this generation’s James Taylor.” Not quite, but the promoter tells me the show has already pre-sold very well. See you at O’Leaver’s (if I’m able).

— By the way, the webboard is down for server upgrades. Check back tomorrow if you have something on your mind.–

Column 28: An Irish Rover Returns
Finding a lump of gold in a pot of cheese.

There was no column here last week because, well, I wasn’t in the country. Instead, I was in Ireland for a week’s worth of boiled potatoes and cold Guinness, crumbling castles and jagged cliffs, bad hotels and tacky gift shops, and of course, lots and lots of St. Patrick’s’ Day-style music.

Other than the Cliffs of Moher, it was the pubs and music that made spending 35 hours in cramped jets and crowded airports worthwhile. You go to the pubs in Ireland expecting to hear the same traditional music that we’ve all come to know from Lucky Charms commercials and reruns of “The Quiet Man.” I never deluded myself into thinking that I was going to find Ireland’s hidden underground indie-rock scene.

Instead, I was content to find comfortable pubs and drown my nights in pints of Kilkenny, Guinness and Smithwicks (pronounced “Smitticks” — you best not pronounce the “w” if you want a decent pour). If you get there at 8:30, the place will be nearly empty, with only a handful of locals staring up at the live horse races televised from Newton Abbot, Folkestone or Naas and bet on at Ladbrokes booking parlors located almost everywhere. But by 9:30 — the unofficial starting time for all bands — the pubs are crush-full with camera-toting tourists looking for a “slice of real Ireland,” and a smattering of locals whose bane in life is putting up with camera-toting tourists.

On the first four days, there weren’t any surprises. The music sounded pretty much like what you’d hear if you venture out to our versions of The Dubliner or The Brazen Head on a live music night. Irish bands are essentially cover bands playing songs handed down from generation to generation, with the most popular ones eventually making it over to the states where they’re played every St. Patrick’s day for the beer-soaked masses. The tourists not only want — they expect to hear “Wild Rover” with its 4-beat clap-along or “Rye Whiskey” (“I’m a rambler / I’m a gambler / I’m a long way from home…”) or, god help me, “Danny Boy,” which is blared through every gift shop and Blarney Wollen Mills outlet from County Wicklow to County Clare.

And so it was in Dublin and Kinsale, groggy nights filled with drunken group singing and annoying banter from brogue-inflicted band leaders who know just what to say to please the needy tourists, all of whom are proud, chest-thumping great-grandsons of Ireland whose own brogues were worn away generations ago, replaced with nasal Boston accents.

Then, six days into the trip, came Killarney. As the evening began, my companion and I, worn down from the past five days of reveling, decided to stick close to the hotel and stumbled into a hole-in-the-wall pub called Paddy Murphy’s. Sitting in a corner right behind the front door was the night’s entertainers — a twenty-something accordionist, a banjo player who looked like his father and a guitarist/vocalist that was probably an uncle. Unlike the elaborate set-ups from prior evenings, there was no sound system or lights, just the trio sitting behind a table with three jars of Guinness.

Instead of playing the usual crowd-beloved standards, the lads performed traditional instrumentals I’d never heard before. How do I know they were traditionals? By the look on the face of the old man — a local you could tell by his clothing — who sat across from them and grinned with every satisfying keystroke and banjo pluck. It wasn’t until the third song that Uncle Guitarist took voice, and what a sad, lonely voice he had. His moan was drawn in layers of sorrow, singing stories of famine deaths, lost wars and broken hearts. There were no happy sing-a-longs; no clapping, unicorns or laughter. Ireland’s true song is one long, tragic dirge, a testimony to suffering and survival even if it means leaving your home behind forever.

The next night, also in Killarney, we found the usual barn full of drunken, happy tourists pleading for their “Whiskey in a Jar.” We snuck out early and found Courtney’s, a room so dark with 18th Century lighting that you could barely see your pint in front of your face. This time it was a banjo, guitar and harp — no vocals — playing intricate instrumentals augmented by chiming, syncopated plucking. Called Sliba Luchra (I’m sure my spelling is wrong, thanks to Guinness), the young trio’s arrangements were slightly askew, purposely odd and strangely sad and yearning. It was like listening to a Celtic version of Tristeza or Tortoise. I hadn’t found Ireland’s indie rock. I had found something better.

Two days later I was back home, with “Danny Boy” and Guinness still ringing in my head, but thinking about Paddy’s and Courtney’s and the music I left behind.

So I’m back from Ireland. I’ll fill you in on the “music scene” tomorrow when I put this week’s column online and talk more about the trip. I can tell you right now that the worst part was traveling there and back. Avoid Aire Lingus at all costs. Fly American or British Airways, it’s worth the extra jack. Believe me. Coming back was the worst overall flight experience I’ve had in a long time (I have had worse, though).

Incidentally, I would have gone to the Neko Case show last night had I known it was a no-smoking show. As always is the case when you’re in a jetliner for 10 hours, I picked up a chest-cold thing and didn’t want to make it worse. There’s no smoking allowed at any bars and restaurants in Ireland. The ban doesn’t seem to have had an impact on their bar scene whatsoever. The flight did give me a chance to write a dozen or so CD reviews, which will be going online over the next few days, so watch the reviews page and the matrix for updates.

What happened while I was gone?

— The hiatus is over. Saddle Creek confirmed rumors of the much-anticipated second-coming of Cursive. The label says the band will start working on new music later this summer, with possibly a new record mid-late next year in terms of release date. Does that mean the inevitable hiatus (or end) for The Good Life? Well, maybe The Good Life as we’ve known it…

— I’m told Homer’s has had a change in management, with Rick Galusha announcing his departure and Mike Fratt taking his place as the company’s president. Who knows what it’ll mean. I’m trying to track Fratt down to see. The story of Homer’s and its continued survival in the now-viscous, cut-throat business of music retailing needs to be told along with Fratt’s plans for continued survival (and prosperity?).

— Before I left, Fratt e-mailed to tell me that Bright Eyes’ I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning sales have surpassed 250,000, passing Lifted… by many thousand. Saddle Creek confirmed this. I figured Wide Awake would lift Lifted‘s sales. It has, but not to the degree I expected. At this pace, Wide Awake is on target to be the first Creek CD to go gold… Digital Ash sales are at 176,000, by the way…

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